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Article Published March 23, 2004 BOOK REVIEW By: Paul Milner, Park Ridge, Illinois BOOK: Voyage of a Different Kind: The Associated Loyalist of Kingston and Adolphustown
Second printing by Global Heritage Press Inc., Milton, Ontario, Canada 2000. (first printing by Mika Publishing, Belleville, Ontario in 1984) 180 pp., Illustrations, Index, Hardcover. 
At the end of the Revolutionary War, thousands of Loyalist refugees were behind British lines in New York City and had to be evacuated. Civilians and unattached soldiers formed companies of militia called Associated Loyalists. Most of these were seeking resettlement in Nova Scotia. This book is about a small but significant group that migrated to the headwaters of the St. Lawrence River to settle in what was called Cataraqui, now the settlements of Kingston and Adolphustown along the northeast shore of Lake Ontario.This unique migration, led by Michael Grass and Peter Van Alstine lasted through 1783 and into 1784 with a wintering in Sorel on the St. Lawrence River. The pre-exile stories of these leaders are provided. The story of the organization, toil, complaints, deaths and survival along the way is described. This work grew from a graduate thesis, so there are many detailed footnotes for further research. The appendices identify the many individual participants in this migration. There is a list of those who signed up to evacuate and these names can be matched against those who arrived and settled as opposed to those who did not actually leave New York. There are ninety-one males and/or heads of households mustered in the new settlement of Adolphustown in October of 1784, many of whom were part of this migration. The biographical sketches for these families take many back to the Hackensack River Valley, with a smattering of folks coming from across New York and New Jersey. Care needs to be used with the index for it only includes names in the text and two of the seven appendices. This is a valuable resource that clearly tells the story of an unusual migration of Associated Loyalists from New York to Lake Ontario with lots of names and biographical material for further research. Paul Milner, Park Ridge, Illinois. Read more about this book >>
Reprinted with permission: originally published in The Federation of Genealogical Societies' FORUM Magazine, vol 13, number 2
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